Activity table Needed Multipliers filters now include calls of entries with unknown multipliers.
Great circle maps have been added to the web site, for Alaska (thanks AB8XX/KL7) and Iceland (thanks TF4M).
The Yaesu FT-857 radio is now supported. Thanks AB8XX and GØDVJ.
The ACOM 2000A amplifier is now supported for use with radio 1. SkookumLogger optionally sets drive power and antenna per-band. See the Controlling an Amplifier topic in the Operating section of SkookumLogger Help. Thanks W2CS.
SkookumLogger 1.8.18 has two new options in Logging preferences:
These options address delays in handling keyboard key presses when you log has many QSOs and you are receiving many internet spots. Advanced users might want to leave log searching enabled via the checkbox, then set xxx to the current number of QSOs in a contest when they notice keyboard delays becoming bothersome.
The K3 SPEED control no longer affects CW sending speed in SkookumLogger. There was some evidence that the feature was causing spurious speed changes. Not polling for the speed setting also increases the update rate for other information (frequency, mode) without increasing the polling rate. Thanks TF4M.
Corrected the fix in 1.8.17 for RSGB Sprint Cabrillo format. Thanks again M1ACB.
Resolve a crash when adjusting SO2R blend when there is no connected SO2R Box. Thanks JH5GHM.
Correctly fixed the K3 timeout issue associated with stalled K3 poll responses, claimed to have been fixed in 1.8.17.
The Mode and Band choices in the Log Settings sheet were being reset each time the sheet was opened. After the end of a contest, the Mode choices were also improperly disabled after the log's contest had ended. Note that if you change a setting, such as Band, that affects how your score is computed, then you must choose Log ► Rebuild Checksheets after closing the Settings sheet.
The URL for AR-Cluster DX Spots Guide led to a defunct site and has now been changed.
Under some circumstances, the P3 sweep was stalled for many seconds after changing bands.
SO2R preferences now has a checkbox and slider controlling the blend feature of the YCCC SO2R Box. Requested by JH5GHM.
Now ask for permission to use Location Manager at startup only if the Set from Location Services item is checked in Exchange preferences.
Help has a new topic titled Getting Started with a direct link in the “Of special interest” box on the anchor page. This topic is intended to assist new users who wonder why they don’t see anything when starting SkookumLogger the very first time. Thanks MØPKW.
RSGB changed the format of the Cabrillo QSO record for their sprint contests, and perhaps others as well. SkookumLogger has been updated for the RSGB Sprint events. Thanks M1ACB and GØDVJ.
K3 poll timeout has been increased from 10 seconds to 60 seconds. Holding some K3 buttons, such as REV, stalls poll responses and was causing spurious timeouts.
In SO2R mode, Radio ► Switch Transmit Radio wasn’t working unless the log window was active.
UKEICC and Stew Perry contests were computing the wrong distance multiplier value for distances exactly an integer multiple of 500 km. Thanks GØDVJ.
Some self-created activities used the sent exchange call as the source; others used the current operator's call. Now the current operator's call is always used. Thanks W2RU.
The firmware version for a connected YCCC SO2R box is displayed in the SO2R preferences pane.
The Sent Exchange and Messages Editor code has been updated. There should be no apparent changes in appearance or behavior, but the window should open more reliably. Thanks W2XO and W2RU.
The default sent exchange template for ARRL SS contests now includes sent call.
SkookumLogger no longer automatically turns on SO2R mode when it discovers a YCCC SO2R Box.
SkookumLogger now selects the second full weekend in November instead of the first for the OKOM CW DX Contest. Thanks GØDVJ.
SkookumLogger now updates the partial call adornments (font and color) when keyboard focus leaves a QSO Info entry field. Thanks GØDVJ.
SkookumLogger now trims extra spaces surrounding the enitity name in the QSO Information text.
When SkookumLogger suddenly begins to act strangely, it is usually best to quit and restart. If you can, let me know what you were doing just before the problem arose. One example of strange behavior: typing into a call entry field doesn’t do anything after frantically pounding many different keys.
If you force-quit SkookumLogger, changes that you made to preferences will be lost so you will need to change them again when you restart.
A very rare hang deep in serial port communications has reappeared, perhaps only in Yosemite. This release attempts to prevent that hang, but it is difficult to test because I don’t know how to cause the hang. The symptom is that SkookumLogger stalls trying to connect to a serial device. Force-quitting and restarting SkookumLogger doesn’t help, nor does logging out and logging in. Worse, OS X hangs forever when you attempt to restart; the only solution is to power-cycle your computer.
Some operators like to truncate the acknowledge-and-log message after the TU by tapping the esc key. This is convenient when you are running and you know there is another station ready to call you. As your log grows, the time required for SkookumLogger to process the newly-logged QSO increases and the esc key tap isn’t recognized until that processing completes. Instead of tapping the esc key, tap your paddle; that aborts sending immediately without adding an extra dot or dash.
The Great Circle map now has crosshairs. The color of the lines is the same as the stroke color for the target point. Set the opacity of that color to 0% if you don’t want to see the crosshairs.
The status string for calls with unknown multiplier status is now *** POSSIBLY A MULTIPLIER *** instead of *** MULTIPLIER ***.
Activities created from DX Cluster spots are now tagged with the time in the spot message instead of time that the message was received. If the age of a “new” spot is greater than the Entry Age Threshold preference, then the spot is ignored. Thanks WA1Z.
Editing items in your Buddies list in Me preferences works again. Thanks GØDVJ.
The log table column widths for the two suspect columns has been increased slightly so that the SQ and SM titles fit when running SkookumLogger on Yosemite.
The OK-OM DX Contest configuration was incomplete, with the side effect of disabling some popup menus in Log Settings. Thanks GØDVJ.
The previous release was somehow corrupted: missing application icon and other issues. I will avoid .13 version numbers in the future.
For certain contests and preference settings the contest chooser dialog would never close no matter how many times you hammered the Done button. Thanks KW4E.
OTHER appearing in the info field of a skimmer spot defaults to Data mode.
Always use SPLIT mode (instead of RIT offset) when grabbing split spots with a K3 radio.
Replace 30-year-old approximation for sun position with modern calculation to improve terminator plot. Thanks W2RU.
Updated default SCP and countries databases.
Activity tables now always show spots for your buddies and yourself regardless of filter choices.
File ► Submit Log for SCP sends your Cabrillo log to the Super Check Partial database maintainer.
Add detection of some types of file corruption when loading a log, instead of simply crashing. Thanks GØDVJ.
Use QSO’s sent grid when computing distance to received grid. Was using grid from preferences; not necessarily the same.
Correct some subtle UI visual inconsistencies made obvious by Yosemite.
Do not display CW Speed when WinKeyer is not connected. Was displaying speed set by K3 radio without checking for connected keyer.
Grabbing a phone spot on another band where the LSB/USB choice was different was failing to change the radio mode for K3.
Log ► Rebuild Checksheets wasn’t clearing checksheets before rebuilding them, so the QSO counts in the checksheets and the Silly Statistics reports had inflated values. Thanks GØDVJ.
Transmit antenna selection is remembered per-band.
Setting up a split when changing bands and mode was sometimes settling on incorrect frequencies.
Left-clicking on a QSO entry field to change keyboard focus was sometimes changing split radio set up. Thanks W2RU.
Choosing Clear (F11) wasn't always clearing all QSO entry fields in the active QSO entry box.
QSX detection in DX Cluster spots was failing for the case of a split specified as an offset in kHz.
When updating your exchange archive with a QSO containing a grid:
When pre-filling a grid QSO entry field from your exchange archive:
Fixed a rarely-occurring crash discovered by W2RU. More than you want to know: the crash was an abort on an unhandled exception caused by a nil info field value. None of the QSO entry field values are expected be nil; an empty field is represent by an empty string. But pressing the delete key, for example, sets the field value to nil instead of to the empty string when the last character is erased. SkookumLogger was anticipating that situation (by setting any nil fields to empty strings) when saving a QSO (return key), but not when updating the QSO entry status (tab or spacebar out of a nil-valued field) for some contest types.
Added support for UKEICC 80m Contest. Requested by GØDVJ.
Added support for RSGB 21/28 MHz contest, both sides. Requested by GØDVJ. Note: RSGB defines many custom Cabrillo tags and requires log submission via a web page linked on their rules page. So, SkookumLogger cannot submit your log for you via email. Also, the rules page URL has a date component, which implies that the link to the rules in SkookumLogger will be broken next year.
The Operator column in the Log table now has a pop up menu listing the operator calls from the Cabrillo Operator List table in Log Settings. Suggested by 2EØGUI.
Frequency and mode setting for the K3 radio has been reworked to improve behavior when a frequency change causes a band change. One side-effect of this change is that the per-band settings for P3 SPAN and CENTER are now correctly restored.
The & Message string (Morse sent exchange message) in Sent Exchange and Messages Editor is now initialized from default sent exchange elements when a new log is created, and no longer changed when a sent exchange element is edited. This removes various cases where your customized & message gets clobbered, but you may need to edit the & message yourself when you change a sent exchange value.
JH5GHM has updated code for the TS-590S and FTDX-3000 to improve DVR support and frequency up/down control via keyboard and media wheels.
The About SO2R page in the Overviews section of the help book now describes SkookumLogger support for the YCCC SO2R Box.
The new wizardry option “Change radio mode when set frequency” determines whether or not SkookumLogger guesses radio mode using the phone subband table when you set radio frequency using Radio ► Set Frequencies… or by typing a number into the active call field.
Typing CW or SSB into the call field followed by space or return sets the radio mode and clears the QSO entry box. Thanks JH5GHM.
The source call for internally-created activities is now the current operator call instead of the sent call. Thanks JH5GHM.
MicroHAM-related code has been updated by WD7K.
Calls that appear in the Buddies list in your Me preferences are now decorated with the font and color specified by the new Myself and Buddies choice in the Fonts and Colors box of Logging preferences. Thanks JH5GHM.
The Set SSB Beacon Interval item in the Messages menu has been relocated in the menu and renamed Set Voice Beacon Interval.
The Messages ► Record Voice Messages ► menu item was always disabled. Thanks JH5GHM.
The antenna configuration dialog has several new pattern types for half-wave dipoles operated on harmonically-related bands. See the Configuring Antenna page in the help book for details.
SkookumLogger now posts a message in the Information Messages window and stops trying to discover your location when the OS X Location service returns a failure. Typically this happens because WiFi is unavailable. SkookumLogger tries to use the Location service each time SkookumLogger is started.
The activity blacklist is now persistent. Blacklisted calls are saved in ~/Application Support/SkookumLogger/BlacklistedCalls.txt. You can edit this file with any text editor to remove entries. I got tired of seeing skimmers spotting B4JR.
It is now possible to change the call of the station on the other end of a QTC Series exchange after beginning the exchange. Thanks GØDVJ.
It is now possible to edit the timestamp (UTC column) for logged QSOs. See the Editing a QSO page in the help book for details.
Prevent beginning to receive a QTC Series unless there is a valid call sign in the call entry field of the QSO data entry box with transmit focus. A nil call sign was previously accepted, causing disaster. Thanks GØDVJ.
The Radio ► Switch Transmit Radio command is disabled unless there are two open radio connections. Thanks WD7K.
The selected transmit radio is now identified in the QSO data entry boxes by a distinctive background color for the radio mode label. This identifier is closer to where you are usually looking than the previous identifiers — the box labels at the right edge of the boxes. Thanks W2RU.
SkookumLogger supports the new CERTIFICATE Cabrillo tag. See the help tag for the Certificate checkbox in the Log Settings window for information. The default value for new logs is YES. Thanks WWROF.
The SkookumLogger extensions to the ORSSerialPort framework have been merged with the latest version of Andrew's ORSSerialPort code. There should be no change in behavior, except perhaps somewhat more robust reaction to unplugging cables to in-use USB-serial devices.
ICOM radio support has been tested in the 2-radio configuration. Thanks WD7K.
The Hawaii QSO Party multiplier list changed since last year. Thanks W2RU.
When you open Log Settings, SkookumLogger normally builds a list with all future contest event dates for the next year. For CWT events only (which occur three times every week — 156 times per year), SkookumLogger instead determines one date: the next event with end date beyond the current date. This date is used when you create a new CWT log or reset a copy of an existing CWT log. Thanks WB5EIN.
Added support for Kenwood TS-480 radio.
Implemented support for band change commands for Yaesu FT-2000.
Added support for two simultaneous radio connections. See the Radios page in the Overviews section of SkookumLogger Help for details.
SkookumLogger now automatically enables WinKeyer output ports based on the selected transmit radio; the corresponding preference items have been removed.
SkookumLogger has a new preference pane, SO2R, with a single option. See the About SO2R page in the Overviews section of SkookumLogger Help for details. Additional items relating to SO2R mode will appear in the new pane as we expand support for SO2R mode.
Corrected an error in Yaesu FT-2000 module when stopping transmission. The error initially appeared to be related to a blinking LED on the radio, but the behavior of that LED did not change. Thanks GØDVJ.
Multipliers were not being tracked in the RDAC contest.
The SubRX on/off commands were enabled for all Kenwood radio types, instead of only the types that have sub-receivers. Thanks W2RU.
A classic programming error (assignment where comparison was intended) was causing keyboard focus to jump from Run to Pounce when attempting to log a QSO under some circumstances. Not proud of myself for making the error, but a bit puffed-up that I was able to find it.
Layout of items in the Cumulative Rates section of the Rate Window was botched in a different way after the repairs in 1.8.2. Thanks GØDVJ.
A reminder: SkookumLogger no longer automatically rescores your log when you edit a Log table field. You must cause the rescan yourself using the Log ► Rebuild Checksheets function. There is no default shortcut for this menu item; I assign ⌘R.
If you use multiple monitors with SkookumLogger and want to preserve window positions on all screens, turn off the “Displays have separate Spaces” option in your Mission Control preferences. Otherwise, OS X gathers all open SkookumLogger windows onto the same screen as the main window; that is an OS X “feature.”
Log changes made by editing QSOs in a log table are now broadcast to other logs via SkookumNet. However, changes made by undoing such edits are not broadcast.
SkookumLogger now supports the Elecraft KX3 radio.
It is now possible to edit the content of a grid field in the Log table. More generally, the formatters for all editable table columns have been scrubbed and described in the Help Book text entry page. Thanks GØDVJ.
Serial numbers are now right-justified in the log table and displayed without leading zeros since padding isn’t necessary.
The Region check sheet for WAE was initially showing all regions, but the Area popup said AF instead of All. Thanks GØDVJ.
The numerical values for cumulative rates were drawn on the wrong rows for contests like WAE that didn’t span all HF contest bands. This bug has existed since the numerical values were introduced many releases ago. Thanks GØDVJ.
The Reset Log function has been moved to the end of the Log menu, where it is less likely to be accidentally invoked. Thanks W2CS.
Radio ► Turn SubRX On and Radio ► TurnSubRX Off are implemented for the TS-950SDX radio.
Using the arrow keys to bump K3 RIT/XIT now turns RIT on if it is off.
Use of the CLLocation class, introduced in 1.8.0, was causing a crash at startup on MacBook Pros running Lion (10.7.5). You won’t be able to use 1.8.0 to update to 1.8.1 in this case. Instead, download the latest version of SkookumLogger via the link on the main web page. Thanks HB9CEY and WT4BT.
Use of the Location Service to set your coordinates was being turned off prematurely.
There have been many behind-the-scenes changes in SkookumLogger which have likely introduced new bugs. Please let me know if you encounter a reproducible problem. JH5GHM and JA1OJE, operating as K1O, used SkookumLogger 1.7.27 during WRTC2014, and they had some unresolved problems. If you use SkookumLogger with either a large log or with SkookumNet enabled, and you can identify reproducible cases of stalls or loss of log synchronization, please do email me details.
I have begun attempting to keep SkookumLogger Help up to date, and will be referring to that documentation for details about things mentioned in these release notes. As a reminder, you can directly search for phrases like “Editing a QSO” by clicking on the Help menu in SkookumLogger and typing into the Search field. Eventually I expect the separate Users Guide document to lose its Reference chapters and return to a conversational document describing how to apply SkookumLogger for various styles of contesting.
JH5GHM has optimized control of the TS-590 radio for use with his custom-built interface.
WD7K has increased the polling rate for ICOM radios, enhanced control of RIT/XIT, and added support for the IC751A.
The Edit QSO panel has been replaced by direct editing in the Log table. The Received exchange column in the Log table has been replaced by separate columns for the exchange fields relevant to the Log’s contest type. The cell content for all columns except UTC, Band, Sent, and the flag columns can be edited in place. See Editing a QSO in SkookumLogger Help. Thanks N1AA.
SkookumLogger optionally can use Location Services to monitor your geographic coordinate and update your sent exchange grid preference. See Exchange Preferences in SkookumLogger Help. Thanks W6FB.
A new menu, Activities, has been added to the menu bar, containing items relocated from the View, Log, and Radio menus.
The Morse Keyboard menu item has been moved from the View menu to the Morse menu.
Paper logging mode has been removed.
Conditional use of SCP and import of a IARU HQ call history file for WRTC2014 have been removed, along with other code specific to that contest.
The automatically rebuild log option has been removed. See Editing a QSO in SkookumLogger Help.
“UBN” reporting for the CWT nontest has been removed.
Information from the web site Notes section has been moved into the Help book and deleted from the web site. The Notes section is now “Roadmap”.
It was possible to create a call sign containing lowercase letters in the Sent Exchange and Messages Editor. Thanks JH5GHM.
K3 radio control was causing stalls in P3 sweeps by polling the radio too frequently. Thanks N1JM and W6FB.